


No Atheists in Foxholes

by The_lazy_eye



Category: IT (2017), IT - Stephen King, The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: But I'm also not sorry at all, Eddie is Dave, Gore, I'm so sorry, M/M, Richie is Klaus, Violence, War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-06
Updated: 2019-03-06
Packaged: 2019-11-12 14:49:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,490
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18012923
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/The_lazy_eye/pseuds/The_lazy_eye
Summary: "Christ on a cracker, that was a close one! Huh, Eds?” Richie calls over to the man on his right. Adrenaline courses though his veins as he laughs. He feels the sharp spark of fear kickstart his heart into overdrive and he thinks maybe he won’t die from a gunshot, no. Maybe one day his heart will beat too hard, too fast, and it will just give up. He’ll fall over dead like one of those old men in the movies who’ve been scared too badly. Lord knows he’s scared now.





	No Atheists in Foxholes

The sound is deafening. Explosions sounding off from every and any direction, gunshots zipping right past his ears, the thrumming sound of his own heartbeat. The twin shaking of his hands and his breath and he grips the barrel of his rifle.

Long curly hair dangles in front of his face in an almost deadly way. If he misses even second, one cue from his team, he knew he was a goner. He can't risk taking his hands off his gun to fix it, though. All he could do was watch, shoot, and pray.

Richie can hear the sounds of his team shooting, he can see the flashes from their own guns and hear the resounding cracks of their barrels. He can't even remember how he got into this situation.

“Lock and load, Charlie's away!” Echoes through the foxhole and Richie blinks twice and squeeze his own trigger. Maybe someone falls in the distance, maybe they don’t. He will never find out, it’s not like he’s going to climb out of his ditch and check the bodies. Dirt explodes around him as cold sweat runs down the back of his neck. It’s hot. So, so hot but it’s also cold. Richie feels it in his skin as he shakes and shakes and sweats and shakes.

The battle field is no place for a man. It’s no place for anyone.

Something rings out too close to Richie and he jumps in reflex, dirt flying through the air and his ears ringing. His eyes clench shut for one horrific second and the world comes to a slow standstill. He wants for one second, then two before opening his eyes and looking around. An involuntary cheer comes out and he accepts his survival and he smiles a real, genuine smile.

“Christ on a cracker, that was a close one! Huh, Eds?” Richie calls over to the man on his right. Adrenaline courses through his veins as he laughs. He feels the sharp spark of fear kickstart his heart into overdrive and he thinks maybe he won’t die from a gunshot, no. Maybe one day his heart will beat too hard, too fast, and it will just give up. He’ll fall over dead like one of those old men in the movies who’ve been scared too badly. Lord knows he’s scared now.

The only real warmth he feels comes from over there. Sweat slicked arms shine in the light from their gun fire and Richie thinks about the millions of time’s he’s ran his hands over those arms in the short year he’s known Eddie. Richie can feel the ghost of a throb in his fingers as he remembers the way Eddie’s heartbeat feels when Richie runs his hands over his ribcage, his wrist, his throat.

Richie looks to his left, letting time skip a beat before he calls out again. “Eddie?”

Nothing, no movement, no response. Richie can feel that cold sweat on the back of his neck again; piercing, frigid cold as he looks at Eddie, really looks at him. The smile slowly falls from his face, inching its way down in ways Richie refuses to acknowledge as fear.

Richie reaches out and touches his hand to the skin of Eddie’s bicep _. It’s warm_ , Richie thinks idly, _it’s so warm in here_.

Shots continue to ring out around them but Richie doesn’t notice as much anymore. His focus is on Eddie and how he’s lying in the dirt, how he doesn’t seem to move. The hand on Eddie’s arm jerks out and pushes. Eddie’s body gives too easy and maybe Richie pushed harder than he intended. Maybe there was too much emotion, too much fear, too much adrenaline. Maybe Richie doesn’t know his own strength.

Maybe this and maybe that but maybes aren’t good enough as Richie watches Eddie’s head loll to the side. His helmet begins to teeter as any support from Eddie’s neck gives out.

Richie doesn’t have time to feel the way his heart drops into his stomach or the way his blood runs like ice. His hands are on Eddie in an instant and he pulls, desperately pulls at his shirt, his arm, his body, anything he can sink his fingers into. Eddie rolls willingly, his body giving way to the strength in Richie’s hands. He rolls over his right shoulder and onto his back, face up and right in front of Richie.

Except Richie’s not looking at his face, no. Richie’s looking at the fist sized _hole_ in Eddie’s chest. He can feel the sharp cut in his own chest as his hands shake and shake and shake, his eyes widen and his breath shortens.

“Medic!” Richie cries. It’s not loud enough but it draws some attention from the man on his right. It’s not enough, though, because as quick as he looked over he’s back to firing ahead, keeping the enemy at bay. Hands cover the wound, full palms needed to completely cover the way his flesh leaks out of the hole, the way Eddie’s blood spills over the jagged skin.

“Medic!” Comes out louder, longer, and Richie doesn’t feel the way his throat and lungs burn. All he can feel is the hot, wet blood coating his fingers. “Medic!”

_Danger be damned_ is all that runs through his head as he sits back on his heels, putting himself right in the crossfire of us versus them and screams at the top of his lungs.

Fucking hell. Richie can’t see anyone coming for them. There is no one in sight who matters, no one running with gauze and water and anything that might be useful to him. No big, red cross shining like a beacon in the battlefield.

“Hey,” Richie rasps, coming back down toward the man he loves. Eddie’s got one hand still on his gun, his mouth opening and closing, his eyes a distant, vacant stare as any and all of his energy go into processing the situation. “Eddie.”

One of Richie’s hands flies up to Eddie’s face and he taps the skin there, desperate to get any kind of response. It’s a picture perfect parallel. They’ve been in this position before, Richie on top of Eddie with his hand gently caressing the skin there. They would look into each other’s eyes and just be together. It flashes before Richie’s eyes again and again. In the barracks, in the tents, in the foxhole. “Look at me, hey. Look at me.” Eddie does, his eyes a glossy, distant grey.

A bomb goes off in the distance. A trigger is happily squeezed and Richie almost wishes he’s the next one to go down in a haze of bullets and bombs and blood.

Eddie continues to gasp as Richie runs his hand from the edge of his hairline to the bottom of his jaw again and again. “Look at me,” he chants and Eddie does. God, he does.

“It’s okay,” Richie whispers even though it’s not. Even though he can feel Eddie dying beneath him. It’s almost sickening, the way he can feel Eddie’s heart beating in his open wound.

Richie can’t help the way he looks down into Eddie’s eyes. He can’t help the way he silently pleads, begs for the world to stop spinning for even just one moment. He wants to relive this, he wants to relive every single moment he’s ever had with Eddie. He wants to go back to the moment they met; Richie on the floor of their dirty dormitory and Eddie confused and tired and right there. He wants to go back to the bus rides; the way Eddie’s hand rested firmly on his shoulder, squeezing and reassuring and so grounding. He _begs to_ go back to the dance. He wants to feel the skin beneath Eddies shirt, where it rode up right above the belt of his pants. it was warm and soft on the dance floor, in the bathrooms, in Eddie’s bed.

God, please, this is too fucking much. Blood dribbles out of the corner of Eddie’s mouth and Richie sobs into the space between them. “Please, stay with me,” he begs as if Eddie has a choice in it. “Please, please, please stay with me, Eddie.”

Eddie’s eyes are wet as Richie’s tears fall onto his face. It doesn’t take long before they start to slip shut, before the grip Eddie has on his gun starts to loosen. “No!” Richie cries because this can’t be happening. This can’t be how it ends. They’re too young, they’re too close to the end. This isn’t supposed to be the end, god dammit. This isn’t how the story ends. “Dammit, I need a medic!” Richie calls again into the battlefield, one last time. It’s a last-ditch effort to save a dead man.

His own body shakes as the one beneath him begins to still. A scream rips through him as he watches, helpless, as the man he loves fades away.

 

**Author's Note:**

> I was rewatching episode six and when Klaus is begging Dave to look at him I couldn't help but think of the Niebolt scene in IT 2017
> 
> This was supposed to be 500 words. Whoops. Anyway I'm glad I was able to write something bc writers block/stress has been KILLER. Big thanks for Studpuffin for beta reading this for me. I'm sorry, sho. I didn't mean to break your heart. She is ALSO writing a IT/TUA crossover so go check it out because its WORTH reading. 
> 
> Come talk to me @ reddie-for-anything.tumblr.com !


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